Fantasy Baseball Edge: 25 Pitching Stats

ARLINGTON, TX - MAY 21: A.J. Pierzynski #12 of the Texas Rangers congratulates teammate and starting pitcher Yu Darvish #11 on helping to turn a double play during the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Oakland Athletics at Rangers Ballpark on May 21, 2013 in Arlington, Texas. Oakland won 1-0. (Photo by Brandon Wade/Getty Images)

After giving you 25 stats on hitters last week, we at RotoAnalysis are back with some tidbits on pitchers. From ERA to FIP and xFIP we look to find some unique ways to parse through all of the available numbers to bring you some interesting facts to set your lineups, make trades, or understand what you see from a pitcher each day with a more detailed understanding.

1. Yu Darvish has the highest Whiff/Swing rate in the league at 40.26% on his fastball.

2. Only 7 other pitchers have rates above 25%. By no coincidence, Darvish leads the league in Ks.

3. In terms of every pitch, Darvish’s Whiff/Swing remains the highest at 36.10%. At #2 is a familiar face: Francisco Liraino, whose 35.88% rate makes him the only other pitcher with a rate above 30%.

4. Matt Moore has left 91.1% of the runners he has allowed on base. That’s the highest rate in the league by 5% and far above the league average of 74%.

5. Although Moore has a 2.21 ERA, he has a 4.35 xFIP and has only pitched into the 7th inning once since April 22nd.

6. Luis Mendoza has a 5.05 ERA and Wade Davis has a 5.71 ERA this season.

7. Danny Duffy made his first rehab appearance earlier this week and Felipe Paulino is a week or two behind Duffy. Both will be major improvements in the rotation.

8. C.J. Wilson has seen his strikeout rate jump from 7.70 K/9 to 8.43.

9. Wilson threw his slider 9.3% of the time last year as opposed to 20.7% of the time this year.

10. Why is Justin Verlander struggling? The .368 BABIP against him is 80 points higher than his career average.

11. Verlander’s FIP is the lowest it has been in his career so far.

12. Jonathon Niese gave up 15 runs in his first two starts in May.

13. Since then, he has allowed 3 earned runs in 3 starts. Don’t let him sit on the waiver wire for long.

14. Although Kris Medlen has posted a 3.16 ERA, he has the highest xFIP in the Braves rotation and may lose his spot when Brandon Beachy returns from injury.

15. Ryan Dempster has the 5th best strikeout rate in the league with 10.83 K/9 – that’s more than Max Scherzer, Felix Hernandez, or phenom Matt Harvey.

16. Hisashi Iwakuma is allowing line drives by hitters as just 13.7% of their batted balls in play, the lowest rate in the league.

17. After allowing home runs on less than 7% of his fly balls and less than .8 per 9 innings, Matt Cain is at 16.5% and 1.71 this season.

18. Matt Harvey is on pace for 278 strikeouts.

19. That figure hasn’t be approached since Randy Johnson had 290 in 2004.

20. R.A. Dickey has nearly doubled his walk rate in 2013 from 2.08 BB/9 last season to 4.06.

21. The highest K/BB rate in the league belongs to Adam Wainwright at 12.33.

22. The pitcher with the largest difference between his ERA and FIP is Edwin Jackson, who has a 6.11 ERA but a 3.69 FIP.

23. Bartolo Colon is the most dependent on one pitch of any pitcher in the league, throwing his fastball 85.9% of the time.

24. So far this season, both the Tigers and Red Sox entire pitching staffs are striking out more than a batter per inning (9.71 and 9.20 K/9 respectively).

25. In the past century, no team has done that. Ever. Let the era of strikeouts reign on!